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Re:The solution to the housing crisis is extremely simple by jacknews on Sunday April 23, 2017 @10:05AM (#14178188)
Yes they could just live on the street.

By "afford housing" I don't mean just buying, but also renting. Rent prices reflect sale prices.

Re:The solution to the housing crisis is extremely simple by anovikov on Sunday April 23, 2017 @10:11AM (#14178214)
Well, this again sounds like communism. No one is entitled to real estate. For that matter, there is a great amount of essentially free real estate in every country, a lot of it in good repair - just in the places where there are no jobs. That isn't even a thing - what's limited is a supply of real estate in places where everyone wants to be.

No fiscal solution could fix San Francisco housing prices, only 'fix' would be crushing Silicon Valley so it ceases to be attractive place to be.

If renting is a problem you are doing something wrong. Median gross rent in U.S. is $959 a month. That doesn't sound much for developed country to me. Buying real estate is accessible to majority of U.S. households, in fact almost every dual income household. 63.7% have it, and many who don't have it, just don't want it (for example, i am making what it takes to buy an apartment i am living in, in 8-9 months, but i am not buying because i am not a gambler). To me not buying real estate seems a rational choice, unless you have a very 'fixed' career - like, certain that you are going to stay in a place for decades. There are fewer and fewer people like that, labor market gets a lot more fluid.

Re:The solution to the housing crisis is extremely simple by jacknews on Sunday April 23, 2017 @11:51PM (#14181860)
"No one is entitled to real estate."

Why not? We are born onto the earth, and yet under the current system it is already owned by someone else, and we have to slave to those owners just to "earn" a place to be. IMHO We are each entitled to a share of nature as a birthright, and a way to achieve that while still allowing "ownership" or exclusive access to land is to apply a 100% tax. Should one be able to own the air? Or the world's water? It's not far different to land ownership.